Ivyclad Ideas: Historical

This is the seventh in a series of posts aimed at helping anyone joining my reading challenge to fill the board. Ivyclad Bingo permits basically any type of book: novel, ebook, audiobook, comic, manga... 

The following are not recommendations, they are suggestions.

(What's the difference?)

If I haven't read it, it's a suggestion.

If you want to sign up for the Ivyclad Bingo 2018 Challenge, there's still time! Just click here and follow the instructions.

Come hop in my time machine. Let's take a trip to the past.

Any Non-Fiction History Book

Non-fiction is totally permissable on this challenge. Any book about history therefore falls under this heading. Personally, I would recommend Alison Weir's The Lady in the Tower: The Fall of Anne Boleyn. 

My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows

The 100% historically inaccurate story of Lady Jane Grey and her magical shape-shifting husband.

 
The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee

I keep meaning to pick this up! The blurb doesn't mention a time period, but at a guess I'd say Georgian? Maybe Regency? 

 
Alex and Eliza by Melissa De La Cruz

WORK!

If you're familiar with Hamilton: the Musical (or with the history of the American Revolution) then you won't need my help to place this historical love story.

Fawkes by Nadine Brandes

It's 1605 and Thomas has just agreed to join his father's plot to blow up King James. I'm not sure how familiar people outside of Britain are with the gunpowder plot, but you can find an explanation here. 

Beloved by Toni Morrison

A novel that is both extremely abstract and incredibly real. Focuses on the affects of slavery on women.

Superhero | Debut Author | Contemporary | Over 500 Pages | Norse Mythology | Robots |

What's your favourite historical period?

 
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Ivyclad Ideas: Robots

This is the sixth in a series of posts aimed at helping anyone joining my reading challenge to fill the board. Ivyclad Bingo permits basically any type of book: novel, ebook, audiobook, comic, manga... 

The following are not recommendations, they are suggestions.

(What's the difference?)

If I haven't read it, it's a suggestion.

If you want to sign up for the Ivyclad Bingo 2018 Challenge, there's still time! Just click here and follow the instructions.

Feeling a little done with humans right now? 

(Aren't we all?)

Then you're in the right place. Today we're going a little bit metal to bring you some robot recs.

The Lunar Chronicles Series by Marissa Meyer

It's Cinderella (and a whole host of other fairytales) but as you've never seen her before. In this sci-fi retelling, Cinder is a cyborg living on a futuristic earth with her evil stepmother, two stepsisters, and her android best friend.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

Genuinely one of the funniest books you will ever have the pleasure of reading. Earth has just been destroyed so a hyperspace bypass can be built. Arthur Dent has just learnt that his friend Ford is an alien. Now he's flying through the galaxy with Ford, Zaphod Beeblebrox, Trillian, and Marvin, a paranoid android.

Yeah, it's been a weird Thursday. 

Defy the Stars by Claudia Gray

You know that irritating sci-fi trope where the guy gets with a robot girl, because apparently the real women in the vicinity just aren't good enough? Well this novel takes that trope and flips the genders. 

(Side note: No, that doesn't suddenly make me like the trope, but if it's going to exist on this planet then we might as well have every variation possible.)

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Phillip K. Dick

The book that Blade Runner was adapted from. Sci-fi classic set in a dystopian future.

The Cybernetic Tea Shop by Meredith Katz

A short story about a robot who runs a teashop and a woman who can't seem to settle in one place. Only available in Ebook right now, but look at that awesome cover!

 




Superhero | Debut Author | Contemporary | Over 500 Pages | Norse Mythology |

 

Do you like the human/robot romance trope? 

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Books I Wish I Did Not Finish

Life is short, and getting shorter by the minute. If you're not enjoying a book, you might as well give up on it. I'm bad at that though. Once I've started reading a book, I tend to want to finish it. My friends think I'm a bit of a cynic -

(You are a bit of a cynic.)

- But I just can't seem to let go of the hope that it'll get better.  

Sometimes, it does. Other times, not so much.

Here are ten books that I wish I'd never finished.

Ghost Girl by Tonya Hurley

You know how most books aimed at children and teenagers are about how you shouldn't try to fit in? Well this one is about how being popular in school is the most important thing, even if you're dead. 

Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

The only reason I made it all the way through this is because I read it for a book club and felt obligated to finish it. I hated Holden.

Bleak House by Charles Dickens

I read this over summer for a module on mystery fiction. The module was brilliant. One of the best ones on the course. This book was not. I couldn't stand Esther (Dickens cannot write women) and it just has so many plots and characters but at the same time it feels like nothing happens.

The Mystery of Marie Rogêt by Edgar Allan Poe

This is a detective story based on a real murder that was never solved. Guess what? It isn't solved in the story either. There's no pay-off and I was bored.

Enduring Love by Ian McEwan

Not only did I finish this, I read it twice. It was an A-level coursebook and I really needed that A. The first chapter is good. After that it goes downhill fast thanks to an utterly contemptible protagonist and a four page rant about the Hubble Telescope.

This was the worst book I had ever read, until I read...

Pamela by Samuel Richardson

This is undeniably the worst novel ever written. Try and refute that - please try and refute that - and I will prove you wrong. It has a terrible plot. Even making allowances for the time period it was written in, this is not something that can or should be stretched over 500 pages. 

Technically, I had to read this for my course. Well. I had to read up until the marriage. After that I could have dnfed it, but I felt that finishing it was the right thing to do as a responsible student.

(She wanted the right to criticise it.)

I wanted the right to criticise it.

No mercy! What's the worst book you've ever read?

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Spring Bingo Wrap-up

Bekka @ Pretty Deadly Reviews releases a bingo card every season. If you like to oversaturate your blog with book challenges, I recommend taking part. If you don't, I recommend taking part anyway. Live a little.

Sadly, I did not manage to get a full column/row in spring 2018.

New to You Author: Middlemarch by George Eliot 
Spring Release: Super Sons Volume Two: Planet of the Capes by Peter Tomasi and Jorge Jiminez
Thriller: Carrie by Stephen King
Epistolary: Pamela by Samuel Richardson 
Family: Batman: Prelude to the Wedding: Robin vs. Ra's Al Ghul by Tim Seeley
Set in another Country: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie 
Multi-POV: All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven 

That said, I'm still up for the summer 2018 board.

This board runs through June, July, and August. 

Are you taking part?

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May Wrap-up

Here's a horrifying thought - it's already the end of May. 

News from the Reading Front

This is what I thought I'd be like once uni ended.

This is what I'm actually like now that uni has ended.

At first I thought I was just reading a lot of comics because comics were fun, but now I'm thinking I might also be a little burnt out right now when it comes to novels. 

Anyway, let's take a look at what I've read this month...

Carrie by Stephen King - 3 Stars - Review

The Absolutely True Story of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie - 2 Stars - Review

I also read six comic compilations and two comics.

Reading Challenge Check-in

I am now only one book behind on my Goodreads Challenge! 

2018 Witches and Witchcraft Reading Challenge: 1/5

• Carrie by Stephen King (Her mother refers to her as a witch so IT COUNTS.)

Science Fiction VS Fantasy Bingo 2018: 2/25

• Fantastic Beasts - All the Crooked Saints by Maggie Stiefvater 
• It's the End of the World as We Know it - Carrie by Stephen King (Said almost word for word in the book.)

The 2018 Swords and Stars Reading Challenge: 1/20

• Read a Book with Magical Realism in it - All the Crooked Saints by Maggie Stiefvater

Back to the Classics Challenge 2018: 3/12

• A classic written by a woman author - Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë
• A classic crime story, fiction or non-fiction - A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens 
• A classic by an author that's new to you - Pamela or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson (Never again!)

2018 YA Reading Challenge: 3/12  

• All the Crooked Saints by Maggie Stiefvater 
• All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
• The Absolutely True Story of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

 Cloak and Dagger Reading Challenge: 1/5

• Carrie by Stephen King

Ivyclad Bingo (2018 Reading Challenge): 7/16

• Superhero - Nightwing Volume One: Better than Batman by Tim Seeley
• Contemporary - All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
• Over 500 Pages - Pamela by Samuel Richardson
• Historical - A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (Yes, even at the time it was published.)
• Black Cover - Middlemarch by George Eliot 
• Witches - Carrie by Stephen King
• Magic - Zatanna Volume Two: Shades of the Past 

(I see reading Carrie was a good life decision.)

I also joined a new reading challenge this month.

Beat the Backlist 2018: (21/30)

Note: For the purposes of this challenge, anything released before the 1st of January 2018 qualifies as a backlist book.

• Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rossetti (First Published: 1862)
  
• All the Crooked Saints by Maggie Stiefvater (First Published: 2017)
• Ouran High School Host Club Volume Nine by Bisco Hatori (First Published: 2006)
• Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë (First Published: 1847)
• Spiderman/Deadpool Volume One: Isn't it Bromantic? by Joe Kelly and Ed McGuinness (First Published: 2016)
• The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: A Scandal in Bohemia by Arthur Conan Doyle (First Published: 1891)
• Fantomina by Eliza Haywood (First Published: 1724)
• A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (First Published: 1859)
• Pamela by Samuel Richardson (First Published: 1740)
• Titans Volume One: The Return of Wally West by Dan Abnett (First Published: 2017)
• All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven (First Published: 2015)
• Nightwing Volume One: Better than Batman by Tim Seeley (First Published: 2017)
• Titans Volume Two: Made in Manhattan by Dan Abnett (First Published: 2017) 
• Super Sons Volume One: When I Grow up... by Peter Tomasi and Jorge Jiminez (First Published: 2017)
• Carrie by Stephen King (First Published: 1974)
• Maria: or, The Wrongs of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft (First Published: 1798)
• Teen Titans: Year One by Amy Wolfram (First Published: 2008)
• The Absolutely True Story of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (First Published: 2007) 
• Zatanna Volume Two: Shades of the Past by Paul Dini (First Published: 2011)
• Batman and Robin Volume One: Batman Reborn by Grant Morrison (First Published: 2010)
• Nightwing Volume Two: Back to Bludhaven by Tim Seeley (First Published: 2017) 

...I think I should have made the goal for that one a little bit higher. I'm not someone who reads all that many new releases. 

News from the Writing Front

  
This is what I thought I'd be doing after uni ended.

This is what I'm actually doing now that uni has ended.

(You're not seriously telling me that you didn't see that coming?)

I saw it coming, but I underestimated the sheer amount of guilt I'd feel about taking a couple of hours out of my life to write until I found one.

I happen to be really stuck on my current scene anyway. I've got a character who doesn't want to seem emotionally vulnerable in a room with a girl who has seen him emotionally vulnerable before, another girl who used to be a close friend, and a brother who hates him. I honestly have no idea how he should be acting. 

In slightly brighter news, I did finish editing that anthology story and I am happy with it.

News from the Blogging Front

I found out about the GDPR really late, especially considering that I'm in Europe. You'll notice that there are now two cookie consent bars you have to click through. I am sorry about that, but I needed to link to my privacy policy and I wasn't sure how to remove Google's banner (or if I was allowed to). I think I'm GDPR compliant now. If I'm not and you know I'm not then please tell me. 

I'm also now on Twitter. This is mainly thanks to the fact that so many jobs want you to have experience of Twitter so that they can trust you to manage their social media channels -

(Try again.)

This is mainly thanks to the fact that midnight me makes bad, impulse-driven decisions, but you're all welcome to pretend it's because you kept telling me how great the book blogging community is on there. Anyway, it turns out that I have the Twitter skills of a lemon. You can find me at @Ivyclad_Ideas.

News from the Net

• The Super Sons/Dynomutt crossover dropped today. 
• Antman and the Wasp won't be released in the UK until the 6th of August. Is it just me, or does it keep getting later and later? 

 

How was your May?

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